ALWAYS BET ON THE dEEP sTATE:

 In President Trump's rough parlance, she was "the woman."

That's how Trump described Marie Louise Yovanovitch, the widely respected former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, in his July 25 telephone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Now the 60-year-old envoy, who spent more than three decades in the diplomatic service, could prove key to illuminating murky events central to the House impeachment inquiry against Trump.

The veteran diplomat was abruptly ordered back to Washington in May, ending her three-year tour two months early. By then, the events that ultimately would set the stage for the impeachment saga were already in play.

Yovanovitch is one of five current or former State Department employees summoned to provide depositions to investigators from the House committees on intelligence, foreign affairs and oversight. Her closed-door appearance is scheduled Wednesday.

From her perch in the Ukrainian capital, Yovanovitch had a front-row seat to the machinations of Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, who engaged with a range of Ukrainian officials outside normal diplomatic channels in an effort to stir up suspicions about former Vice President Joe Biden, now a leading Democratic presidential candidate, and his son, Hunter.

By all accounts, Giuliani and his Ukrainian contacts found Yovanovitch, who had sought to boost the country's anti-corruption efforts, an impediment. And Trump, in the reconstructed record of the call with Zelensky that the White House released last week, made plain his own animosity.

"The former ambassador from the United States, the woman, was bad news," Trump told Zelensky, who took office in May. "And the people she was dealing with in the Ukraine were bad news, so I just wanted to let you know that."

Vaguely but ominously, Trump added: "She's going to go through some things."

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